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Monthly Archives: January 2013

A guy was preaching the gospel on a street corner. Phil listened, came forward, and offered to accept Christ on the condition the man would stop preaching and go play some pinball at a pinball club on Phil’s dime.

“You will accept Jesus as your lord and savior if I promise to go play Pinball on your money?”

“Yes.”

“Are you making me out to be a poot butt in front of all these people?

“No.”

“What’s the catch?”

“I told you already. You go play pinball. I become a devoted Christian.”

“You have to kneel. Here. In front of everybody,” said the street preacher.

“Okay.”

“Wait a minute. Really?”

“Dude, I think I’m your only convert of the day. Do you really want to talk me out of this?”

He thought for a minute and raised his Bible and declared, “Thank you Jesus for reaching this man!”

A crowd started to gather. They have never seen street preaching actually work before.

The preacher put his hand on Phil’s shoulder. His large cross on a neck chain swung between his two shoulders. His breath smelled of alcohol. His inner elbows bore scars.

“See these scars? Heroin. Jesus saved me from that hell,” he said. “And I know he can save you.”

“I hear he can do that from a lot of people.”

“Repeat after me … um … what’s your name?

“Phil.”

“Repeat after me Phil.”

Phil nodded.

‘Lord Jesus…'”

“Lord Jesus.”

“I accept you as my savior and repent of all my sins against God.”

“I accept you as my savior and repent of all my sins against God.”

“I accept your grace and blood as atonement for my sins.”

“I accept your grace and blood as atonement for my sins.”

“I ask you to guide me on the right road of grace. Amen.”

“I ask you to guide me on the right road of grace. Amen.”

They stood up. Some people in the crowd cheered and clapped their hands.

“Now you need to be baptized.”

“There’s a fountain across the street in the park,” said Phil.

They walked across the street and the preacher baptized Phil in the fountain in his street clothes. Phil got up from the fountain amid some more clapping, and he and the preacher dripped back across the street arm in arm.

“You go play pinball now,” said Phil patting his back. “We have a deal, and I have a newer life.”

“BUT LOOK AT THIS CROWD.”

“We have a deal.”

The preacher walked away grinning and singing “Blessed Assurance” to enjoy pinball at a trendy pinball club around the corner.

Phil took the preacher’s standard speaking spot and began his own sermon from a puddle beneath his feet.

“DEAR BROTHERS AND SISTERS! YOU JUST SAW ME ACCEPT CHRISTIANITY. BUT I HAVE EVEN MORE AMAZING THINGS TO TELL YOU.”

The crowd started dispersing. A few remained.

“I MUST CONFESS! I FOLLOW EVERY RELIGION. I BECOME A CONVERT OF ANY MYTHOLOGY I COME ACROSS.”

“WHY? I’LL TELL YOU WHY. BECAUSE OF THE INFINITE MULTI-VERSES!”

“YES BROTHERS AND SISTERS, UNLIKE YOUR MODERN SCIENTISTS, I KNOW MULTIVERSES EXIST FROM MY OWN DIRECT EVIDENCE. AND LET ME TELL YOU THAT ANY GOD THAT CAN EXIST – DOES EXIST.

He raised his finger to the air.

“EVERY … SINGLE … ONE!”

He swept his finger in a large arc from left to right.

“AND SOME OF THEM ARE REAL HARD ASSES!”

A 13 year old girl asked from the outside of a dress shop, “How does THAT work?”

He toned down. He heard Cassandra pipe in from another dimension through his alien-engineered ear piece.

“That’s her! She is the chaos butterfly!”

His eyes lit up.

“Oh, OH! Good question. Well, here is something you may find useful. I wouldn’t call it the ‘truth’ mind you, but I would say it is a darn functional mythological concept. And as you may or may not know, the multi-verses really need some of those.”

“You’re weird,” she said.

“You have no idea. Do you want to hear one of the most useful religious concepts in the multiverses or not?”

She crossed her arms and bore down her stare. “My mom is coming out in five minutes so make it fast.”

“Okay then. Fast it is.”

He leaned against a building, shook off some more water, and beaconed her to come closer. He spoke in a clear whisper.

“The truth is that there are infinite universes flowing out from within and without each other. And once they create sentient life, that sentient life eventually evolves to run their OWN multiple universes as Gods. Why? Because being a god is fucking cool that’s why.”

“You swore.”

“Oh, OH! OH! I’m sorry! My bad. Sorry. I forgot to be nice. Anyway, with such an arrangement, it is quite possible that ANY being can be at the epicenter of an infinite multi-verse as the God of that infinite multiverse. In fact, as a God of a multiverse, I can make as many gods as I want in as many universe I want to right? And I can be either all powerful, or just a bloke who can’t pay his bills on time.”

“I don’t have any money and my mom uses plastic.”

Phil laughed out loud speaking through chuckles.

“Hee! Hee! Now, if that is the case and YOU … you … are at the epicenter of a multi-verse and I am at the epicenter of another multiverse, is it possible that you and I would have universes that are exactly the same? If we can create ANY universe that is possible there would be massive overlap?”

“That sounds stupid.”

“Bear with me. It gets a LOT more stupider than that, trust me. Anyway, if that is a case there is a universe where the greek god Zeus is at the center. There is also another where Jesus is at the center. And another where your cat is at the center. Wait. Do you have a cat?”

“Yes. Her name is Phoebe. She’s a calico.”

“Ooh. Phoebe. Watch out. She’s a clever one.”

She showed contempt at first and then laughed.

“You are ALL WET!” she mocked.

He continued.

“And if all of us are creating every possible universe, even little Phoebe, then all of us are gods right?”

She huffed a grin.

“For that reason, I accepted Jesus today. Why? Because I want to honor him for the multiverse he has to manage. The one where I actually appear in and need his grace to save me just like here. In his Multi-verse, he is EVERY being. He is even me. In my multiverse, he is one of my beings …. SO … I choose to worship him and any God, monad, deity, demon, ghost or sentient being. Why?”

She started swirling her finger around her ear and looked at him in mocking a crazy stare. Then she leveled her eyes and crossed her arms.

“What if there is NO Gods at all?” she asked.

“Yes! You are a smart one! There is a universe where there are no gods at all. Where else do you think all the other gods CAME from silly?”

“So gods both do and don’t exist depending on the Universe?”

“Bingo.”

“So do you pray to them ALL?”

“Whenever I can. I usually don’t talk to Jehovah when he is in his I’m-a-big-bad-God gig. Not till I get to know Him at least. I usually start talking to new gods in a universe where the God is just a regular guy like a garage mechanic or professional bowler. Amazingly enough, it works a lot better at keeping me on their good sides. Gods often have such big egos. Especially Jehovah with his I-AM-THE-GREAT-ALL-THAT thing. But I feel Him now remembering me in all his forms as we speak, and in all of those he will be kind enough to keep me from his hell worlds or give me access to dampen their suffering to the point where they don’t matter to me.”

“Is this TRUE?” she asked.

“No, it’s total nonsense. Honest. But it’s all I got. But like I said it is a GREAT mythology. Tell me what’s your first name?”

“Heather.”

“Heather, what is YOUR religion as the God of YOUR multiverse? What would you want all your universes to know you want?”

“I want people to be nice.”

“Okay. Heather, will you forgive me for not being nice, and for saying a bad word, and give me the grace to change that?”

She looked smugly down her nose and said, “Yes.”

Phil placed his hands together in a gassho and bowed to Heather.

“Now I walk away, a humble Heatherterian.”

“Heather! WHERE ARE YOU?” screamed her mother.

“Bye,” said Heather.

She walked to her mother. Turned to him, smiled and waved.

“You are a God of a multi-verse mommy. Unless, it’s the one where there is no God at all,” said Heather.

Her mother pointed.

“Look at that wet man!”

“Yeah, he’s kinda weird.”

Phil smiled. He walked across the street into a Starbucks restroom, closed the door and leaned against it’s back side to make sure nobody would push the door open. He left the door unlocked. A puddle emerged beneath him.

He depressed in morse code a message on his wrist watch by pushing the watch face down with his fingers. The watch face bounced up and down on a spring making a small but audible morse code sound.

“H-o-m-e … b-a-s-e … n-o-w.”

Two seconds later, the door immediately opened and a desperate preacher staggered in. In one seamless motion, he whipped off his belt, dropped his pants and plopped down on the toilet and birthed a sickly, moist, resounding thunder.

“Thank you Jesus! For that new soul in heaven and for providing me this restroom!”

The empty rest room was clean but out of toilet paper. He noticed that the air had a funny smell of ozone as soon as he entered.

Lucky for the preacher, there were paper towels.

And he really, really wanted a horse fix. But he thought of his new convert and gathered up the strength to distract the urge.